Save Article

A Hostage to Fortunes

By

Michael Knox Beran

Updated May 15, 2002 12:39 a.m. ET

It is the prerogative of a prophet to imagine doom, and in "Wealth and Democracy" (Broadway, 472 pages, $29.95) Kevin Phillips conjures one vision of the end of the American democracy. The country, he believes, is fast becoming an oligarchy, a republic ruled by a small class of dynasts -- the coroneted figures of the Forbes lists -- with the assistance of a praetorian guard of lawyers and accountants charged with protecting the lucre of the overlords. The rest of the citizenry, overworked and underpaid, is being reduced...